Chocolate Dipped Ice Cream Sandwiches

Have you tried an It's-It? Ice cream, sandwiched between two oatmeal
cookies, then dipped in chocolate... that's right. That's the kind of
summer treat I'm craving these days. It's-Its were created in San
Francisco in the 1920s and you can still find them tucked into ice cream
freezers all over the West Coast.

First, go ahead and make your cookies. In a standing mixer with the
paddle attachment, or using a medium mixing bowl with a hand-mixer,
cream together butter and sugar. Add egg and vanilla. Blend until
ingredients are integrated.

In a separate small mixing bowl, whisk flour, baking soda, baking
powder, and salt. While the standing mixer is still whirling, slowly add
the dry ingredients. Finally, add oats to the batter. Mix until batter
is well blended.

Line 1-2 baking sheets with parchment paper. Scoop dough onto the lined
cookie sheets. Jennie very wisely suggests making 24 tablespoon size
cookies. (We went ahead and made 14 bigger cookies - piggies, I know.
From here on out, I'll stick to Jennie's reasonable portions!) Give the
cookies some room to spread during baking, and use your fingertips to
flatten the dough a bit, flatter disk-shaped cookies make for more
manageable ice cream sandwiches.

Bake cookies for 8-12 minutes until golden, rotating the cookie sheets
halfway through baking to ensure even browning. Let cookies cool for 5
minutes on their baking sheet, then transfer them to a rack to finish
cooling.

Once cookies have cooled completely, scoop (slightly softened) ice cream
between two cookies to make a sandwich. Stick the prepared sandwiches
in the freezer on a parchment-lined baking sheet to chill thoroughly
before dipping them into the chocolate shell.

Making the chocolate shell... Gently melt chocolate with coconut oil in a
double boiler, or microwave. Once the chocolate is just warm, liquidy,
and smooth, stir and you've got your dipping chocolate.
Take each fully-frozen ice cream sandwich, and dip it halfway into the
the melted chocolate. Let the drips fall away and then return the dipped
sandwich to your cold, parchment-lined baking sheet. Freeze the
sandwiches again for 15 minutes, until the chocolate had chilled and
hardened.

Eat and enjoy! Wrap any extra ice cream sandwiches in parchment and store them in the freezer until you're ready to munch again.

makes 12 ice cream sandwiches (we made 7 monster-size sandwiches, but
I will definitely stick with a more manageable size next time)